Enterprise Works

Our ambition is to be recognised not only as a centre for research and teaching excellence, but to be known for our thriving entrepreneurial community. One motivated by public good, which uses enterprise and entrepreneurship to support our students.

The University of York believes in the power of enterprise and entrepreneurship as a driver for this change, to deliver better economic and social outcomes for everyone. Our commitment to ensuring this progress is a bold new initiative - Enterprise Works.

Enterprise Works is the new identity of enterprise support and innovation at York. A diverse, connected, supportive entrepreneurial ecosystem, reaching further into the community than ever before.

With your help, we can provide students, staff and local entrepreneurs a package of support to help test ideas and to build up experience in business.

This includes:

• Training and mentoring
• Access to our startup incubator Phase One
• Funded internships with regional SMEs
• Grants to support the most promising startup businesses

Together as a community we can pool resources and affect change for the next generation of entrepreneurs, the region and beyond.

Yoyo came up with the idea for KodyPay, a hardware-free next-generation mobile phone retail payment app, while still at school. As a Management School student, he was driven to trial the app in a real-world environment and received support from the University to pilot KodyPay in our campus supermarkets.

He also benefited from close support and early-stage finance from the University’s Enterprise Team, Santander Universities, and connections with alumni entrepreneurs who helped him promote the business to potential retail investors.To grow the business, YoYo has recently secured a £1.8m investment from a consortium of private investors including IBM’s Cognition Foundry. 

“York is a great place to start a business. KodyPay has been the most challenging thing I’ve ever undertaken as I have had to sacrifice my social life and work through sleepless nights. It has been a remarkable journey and I could not have done it without the support of the people around me at York, they really have been fantastic and have helped me turn my dream into a reality."